File spoon-archives/marxism-thaxis.archive/marxism-thaxis_1998/marxism-thaxis.9804, message 30


Date: Wed, 1 Apr 1998 12:40:15 +0100
From: James Heartfield <James-AT-heartfield.demon.co.uk>
Subject: Re: M-TH: Socially necessary sex and socially free sex


In message <l03020904b147c4f8a870-AT-[130.244.102.184]>, Hugh Rodwell <m-
14970-AT-mailbox.swipnet.se> writes
>There's just as little point in claiming that sex isn't a biological
>necessity. No sex -- no more human beings (forget utopian Brave New World
>test tube dreams!). No more human beings -- species death. But the survival
>aspect is just the necessary foundation of sex, whose significance for the
>development of humanity will only become clear when society has made this
>foundation rock solid and freed up the creative uses of sex -- in other
>words, the benefits we'll get from *free* sex  as opposed to *necessary*,
>compulsory sex will only become clear under socialism.
>
>A certain minimal amount of sexual time will be necessary for the
>biological needs of the species, all the rest will be ours to dispose of as
>we wish.

This sounds good like a good analogy, but isn't. The analogy does not
work. A society does not *need* sex in the same way that it needs work.
It is conceivable (though unlikely) that all procreation could be by
artificial insemination. Sex take a moment (at least it does with me).
Work dominates our lives. The sex act is just a small component of the
overall reproduction of the human species. Work is the reproduction of
the human species.

There is nothing intrisic to the sex act itself that makes it the focus
of the massively inflated (!) realm of the erotic, the domestic realm,
social intercourse and so on. These things are historical features that
sieze hold of the natural sex act as the canvass on which to elaborate
their social meanings.

Freeing the sex act, as you argue, might well mean freeing sexuality
from the sex act: we are alreay well on the way.
-- 
James Heartfield


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